English novelist (1775-1817)
That sanguine expectation of happiness which is happiness itself.
JANE AUSTEN
Sense and Sensibility
Life seems but a quick succession of busy nothings.
JANE AUSTEN
Mansfield Park
A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of.
JANE AUSTEN
Mansfield Park
When pain is over, the remembrance of it often becomes a pleasure.
JANE AUSTEN
Persuasion
A lady, without a family, was the very best preserver of furniture in the world.
JANE AUSTEN
Persuasion
I have made myself two or three caps to wear of evenings since I came home, and they save me a world of torment as to hair-dressing, which at present gives me no trouble beyond washing and brushing, for my long hair is always plaited up out of sight, and my short hair curls well enough to want no papering.
JANE AUSTEN
letter, Dec. 2, 1798
It must be very improper that a young lady should dream of a gentleman before the gentleman is first known to have dreamt of her.
JANE AUSTEN
Northanger Abbey
I am very much obliged to my dear little George for his messages, for his Love at least--his Duty I suppose was only in consequence of some hint of my favourable intentions towards him from his father or mother. I am sincerely rejoiced however that I ever was born, since it has been the means of procuring him a dish of Tea.
JANE AUSTEN
letter, Dec. 19, 1798
I can recollect nothing more to say at present; perhaps breakfast may assist my ideas. I was deceived -- my breakfast supplied only two ideas -- that the rolls were good and the butter bad.
JANE AUSTEN
letter, Jun. 19, 1799
A scheme of which every part promises delight, can never be successful; and general disappointment is only warded off by the defense of some little peculiar vexation.
JANE AUSTEN
Pride and Prejudice
Let us leave it to the reviewers to abuse such effusions of fancy at their leisure, and over every new novel to talk in threadbare strains of the trash with which the press now groans. Let us not desert one another; we are an injured body.
JANE AUSTEN
Northanger Abbey
One man's ways may be as good as another's, but we all like our own best.
JANE AUSTEN
Persuasion
Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.
JANE AUSTEN
Northanger Abbey
We live entirely in the dressing room now, which I like very much; I always feel so much more elegant in it than in the parlour.
JANE AUSTEN
letter, Dec. 2, 1798
Expect a most agreeable letter; for not being overburdened with subject (having nothing at all to say) I shall have no check to my Genius from beginning to end.
JANE AUSTEN
letter To Cassandra Austen, Jan. 21, 1801
There is, I believe, in every disposition a tendency to some particular evil -- a natural defect, which not even the best education can overcome.
JANE AUSTEN
Pride and Prejudice
Men of sense, whatever you may choose to say, do not want silly wives.
JANE AUSTEN
Emma
People themselves alter so much, that there is something new to be observed in them for ever.
JANE AUSTEN
Pride and Prejudice
I wrote without much effort; for I was rich, and the rich are always respectable, whatever be their style of writing.
JANE AUSTEN
letter to Cassandra Austen, Jun. 20, 1808
It is only a novel ... or, in short, only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best-chosen language.
JANE AUSTEN
Northanger Abbey